Hayden: All of us are really upset because we could have used a fair and balanced review of what we did. … The agency clearly admits it was fly-by-wire in the beginning. They were making it up as they went along and it should have been more well-prepared. They’ve freely admitted that. They said that early on they lacked the core competencies required to undertake an unprecedented program of detaining and interrogating suspected terrorists around the world. But then what the committee does is to take what I said out of context. They take statements I made about the later days of the program, for example when I said it was well-regulated and there were medical personnel available, etc., and then apply it to the early days of the program, when there were not. It misrepresents what I said.

Most Popular

Hirsh: One of the most stunning and cited conclusions of the report is that interrogations of CIA detainees were brutal and far worse than the CIA represented to policymakers and others.

Hayden: That is untrue. And let me give you a data point. John Durham, a special independent prosecutor, over a three-year period investigated every known CIA interaction with every CIA detainee. At the end of that the Obama administration declined any prosecution. [In 2012, the Justice Department announced that its investigation into two interrogation deaths that Durham concluded were suspicious out of the 101 he examined—those of Afghan detainee Gul Rahman and Iraqi detainee Manadel al-Jamadi—would be closed with no charges.] So if A is true how does B get to be true? If the CIA routinely did things they weren’t authorized to do, then why is there no follow-up? I have copies of the DOJ reports they’re using today. The question is, is the DoJ going to open any investigation and the DoJ answer is no. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t have all this supposed documentary evidence saying the agency mistreated these prisoners and then Barack Obama’s and Eric Holder’s Department of Justice saying no, you’ve got bupkis here.

Hirsh: What about the report’s overarching conclusion that these enhanced techniques simply were not effective at getting intelligence?

Hayden: My very best argument is that I went to [then-Deputy CIA Director] Mike Morell and I said, ‘Don’t fuck with me. If this story [about the usefulness of intelligence gained from enhanced techniques] isn’t airtight then I’m not saying it to Congress.’ They came back and said our version of the story is correct. Because of this program Zubaydah begat [Khalid Sheikh Mohammed], who begat [others]. We learned a great deal from the detainees.

Hirsh: The report says that even the CIA’s inspector general was not fully informed about the programs—that in fact the CIA impeded oversight by the IG.

Hayden: The IG never told me that. The IG never reported that to Congress. Look, I’m relying on people below me. If they tell you an untruth, you get rid of them. But I never felt I was being misled, certainly not on the important contours of this program. What they [the committee] are doing is grabbing emails out of the ether in a massive fishing expedition. This is a partisan report, as you can see from the minority report out of the committee.

Hirsh: Can you sort out the discrepancy between your testimony that there were only 97 detainees in the history of the program when the report says there 119?

Hayden: We knew there were more. The high-value-target program—they don’t show up on my list if they’re at the [black] sites. And committee knew all about that. They have chapter and verse from [former CIA IG John] Helgerson about it. It’s a question of what criteria you use. When I met with my team about these discrepancies, I said, ‘You tell [incoming CIA director] Leon Panetta he’s got to change the numbers that have been briefed to Congress.’

Hirsh: The report suggests that you misrepresented what you told Congress in the briefings, telling a meeting of foreign ambassadors to the United States in 2006 that every committee member was "fully briefed."

Hayden: I mean what are they doing—trying to score my public speeches? What’s that about? You want me to go out and score Ron Wyden’s speeches?

Hirsh: You don’t believe you’re in legal jeopardy?

Hayden: No, not at all. I didn’t do anything wrong. How could I be in legal jeopardy?